The Wolves of Winter

"We shall take the weapons of our enemy and use them against him."

Writer: Richard Dinnick
Format: Comic Strip
Released: July-September 2017
Printed in: The Twelfth Doctor #3.5-7

Featuring: Twelfth Doctor, Bill

Synopsis

The TARDIS crashes into the heart of a Viking camp! But this is no interactive history lesson - a terrifying alien force has taken over the icy kingdom. As the snow melts, the Doctor realises that he is about to face more than one unwelcome face from the past...

Verdict

The Wolves of Winter was a very good comic strip adventure! There was a great deal going on and it worked well which was terrific. It finally saw the comic strip debut of Bill from Titan and she had a strong showing. I thought it was brilliant to pit the Ice Warriors against the Twelfth Doctor once again following Empress of Mars and I liked that Bill's recognition of them placed this story after that episode and didn't contradict anything that occurred on television. How it fitted in with Nardole, Missy and the latter part of Series 10 was left unmentioned and I think that was the right move. The 9th century setting was excellent and I liked how it was on a remote and volcanic island. That served the plot very well which was hugely pleasing. I absolutely loved that some of the Ice Warriors were infected with the Flood and them returning following The Waters of Mars was fantastic. They were absolutely deserving of a return and the Martian link with the Ice Warriors was finally put into action. I thought that two returnees for a comic strip adventure was good but things didn't stop there! Quite incredibly, the Haemovores and Fenric made an astonishing comeback! The cliffhanger finish to part two was really good and interesting and I loved how quickly the Doctor was to count off his past companions as they were what he had faith in. I thought that was a lovely mention. Sadly, the likes of Katarina and Sara were looked over which was a bit of a shame. I enjoyed the reference to Cold War with the Doctor mentioning Skaldak and seeing Grand Marshall Sskoll's reaction to that was marvellous. Bill referencing Oxygen was also great and I liked that the Doctor mentioned his recent being mistaken for Odin in The Girl Who Died. There really was a lot of throwback to the past and that's something I'm a big fan of reading. The Vikings were very good and seeing their numerous relationship was really interesting. Torkal's relationship with the Doctor was lovely and the way he had to tell her that her husband was no more despite the outward appearance was a touching and emotional moment. The flashbacks to The Curse of Fenric and the mentioning of the similarities between Ace and Bill was excellent. I thought the ending was a little rushed though which was a slight tarnishing on a fantastic adventure. It just seemed a tad quick and I'm not so sure the Ice Warriors would just accept going home and leaving things to the Doctor so soon after they declared it was a Martian problem and they'd take things into their own hands. Bill being worried because the Doctor was worried was very good and I liked how she was consoling him because he'd already dealt with the Haemovores in the planet's future but his past. The way he was able to convince the Haemovores that Fenric was hoping to gain an allegiance with the Flood could have been fleshed out a bit more, but as a whole, I thought this was a great comic strip story!

Rating: 8/10